Limericks

BILL KURTIS: Coming up it's Lightning Fill in the Blank, but first it's the game where you have to listen for the rhyme. If you'd like to play on air, call or leave a message at 1-888-Wait-Wait. That's 1-888-924-8924, or click the contact us link on our website waitwait.npr.org. There you can find out about attending our weekly live shows back at the Chase Bank Auditorium in Chicago, Illinois and our upcoming show at Tanglewood in Massachusetts on August 29th. And you can check out the latest how-to-do-everything podcast. This week, Mike and Ian tell you how to keep your animals from escaping your zoo. Hi, you're on WAIT WAIT...DON'T TELL ME!

JANET HOUSE: Hi, my name is Janet House, and I'm calling from Seattle.

PETER SAGAL, HOST:

Oh, it's beautiful, Seattle. How are things there?

HOUSE: Well, cloudy and rainy.

SAGAL: Yeah.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: Well, if it makes you any happier, everybody else in the country is miserable because it's so hot.

HOUSE: Oh, yeah. Well, I lived in New York for a long time, so I can't complain about anything.

SAGAL: OK then. Anything else you'd like to complain about before we start?

HOUSE: No, no, no, no, no.

SAGAL: All right. Well, glad to have you with us, Janet. You are going to play the Listener Limerick Challenge. That means that Bill Kurtis is going to read you three news-related limericks with the last word or phrase missing from each. Your job, of course, fill in that last word or phrase. Do that twice, you will be a winner. Ready to play?

HOUSE: OK. Yup.

SAGAL: Here is your first limerick.

KURTIS: I am met with a very impressed stare. Hey buddy, you're really well dressed there, like Tom Sellick I'm cute in my hirsute zoot suit. It's a coat that is woven from...

HOUSE: Hair?

SAGAL: Yes, chest hair, in fact.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

(APPLAUSE)

SAGAL: You love fur coats, but don't want the wrath of PETA? There's a solution. For $4,000 you can buy the limited edition male chest hair coat from the British company Arla. Now of course your first reaction is like, oh, my God, this is disgusting. Sheep meanwhile are like, right, now you think it's gross.

(LAUGHTER)

MO ROCCA: It's a British company? Shouldn't it be a Greek company?

SAGAL: You'd think.

BRIAN BABYLON: But for $4,000?

SAGAL: Yeah.

KYRIE O'CONNOR: For $2,000 you can get one made out of back hair.

(LAUGHTER)

O'CONNOR: For half off.

(APPLAUSE)

SAGAL: Here is your next limerick.

KURTIS: We are Taco Bell's branding elite. We know wording affects how you eat. Renaming can hide what is lurking inside, call it protein but don't call it...

HOUSE: Meat?

SAGAL: Yes.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

(APPLAUSE)

SAGAL: Rather than get sued for false advertising, Taco Bell is removing the word meat from some of its menus and replacing it with a vaguer term protein.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: They're rolling out the so-called power protein menu, which sounds nutritious but also covers their tracks if anything were to, you know, crawl completely accidentally into the meat grinder.

(SOUNDBITE OF DISGUST)

ROCCA: Taco Bell is people.

(LAUGHTER)

ROCCA: I'm telling you.

SAGAL: Here is your last limerick.

KURTIS: At pet shows I won't have to try no more. Extreme rarity, that is what I go for. Like Fred Flintstone I'll get a most useful big pet. Who needs dogs? I'll just buy me a...

HOUSE: Dinosaur?

SAGAL: Dinosaur, yes.

KURTIS: Yes. Hey.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

SAGAL: Very good. Public Policy Polling recently conducted a poll of pet owners and found 52 percent prefer dogs, 21 percent like cats, 18 percent want a dinosaur for a pet.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: They didn't specify what type of dinosaur but, come on, you saw Jurassic Park. This is not a good idea. Take your dinosaur to the dog park and he's like, restaurant.

(LAUGHTER)

BABYLON: You know, I could just see a guy in a body hair jacket walking a tyrannosaurus rex.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: It'd probably be his choice. Bill, how did Janet do on our quiz?